Twenty One
'Everybody Lives'
- aka The Doctor Dances (Part Two)
The wire cutters were dull when Nancy brought them out to cut at the fence and she had to be slow and careful to make sure no one heard her struggling to break through. It had set her back some time, and she'd missed the opportunity to spring from the shadows to the tarpaulin covering the bomb during the guard changeover. She couldn't afford to lose any more time waiting for another changeover, not when she had only just gathered the nerve to go through there.
One the guards notice that there's a massive hole in the fence they're going to tighten up their security so that no one could even think about getting through. This was Nancy's only chance to figure out what happened to Jamie. To put an end to the constant thinking about all of the possibilities that have been running through her head the second she heard that he was gone.
Inside the fence, Nancy waited in the shadows, trying to pluck up the courage to move at the first sign that the guards were distracted. Her heart was beating heavily in her chest and she almost wanted to turn around and give up.
Before the war started Nancy was never one to get into trouble, to put herself in any position where she could get hurt or draw attention to herself. There was always something holding her back, stopping her. And then things changed. Now she only had to worry about herself. The only thing she had to lose was herself. It seemed that desperate times called for desperate measures.
The two soldiers who were guarding the bomb and sharing a cigarette in front of it finally trampled out their stub and moved away to their posts around the fence. Without giving herself enough time to think, Nancy clambered to her feet and rushed across the pavement towards the bomb.
Her feet were light, footsteps quiet with practiced precision and she dropped to her knees in front of the tarpaulin when she reached it. Fumbling with her stolen flashlight and flipping the switch, the ground in front of her lit with a dull glow, one that she hoped none of the soldiers would catch.
She lifted the torch up under her chin as her free hand ghosted over the material covering the bomb and she yanked it up quickly, but she didn't get the opportunity to see what was underneath. An alarm rang through the yard and she dropped her flashlight in shock as a large floodlight swung to shine over her frame.
Soldiers twirled and faced her in an instant, guns pointed in her direction as she shot to her feet and prepared herself to flee.
"Halt!" Cried one of the soldiers from behind the sights of his gun, making Nancy freeze. "Don't move!"
They began to advance on her from every direction as she looked around frantically, trying to find a way for her to run. There was no way out. She was trapped.
One of the soldiers had grabbed at her arms, leading her into a tent by the edge of the camp with barely a word spoken to her. There was a soldier in there sitting next to the table looking pale and weak. He wobbled to his feet as they entered, and his superior waved him away, gesturing for him to sit back down.
"As it were," The officer said, eyeing the sick soldier. "You feeling any better?"
The man looked like he was about to vomit all over the floor, but forced a nod. "Just a touch, sir," He said, flopping back into his seat. His hand reached out to the table for support, and that's when Nancy noticed the scar on the back of his hand. Of course one of them had to be sick.
The leader nodded, a hard look on his face as commands spilled out of his mouth. "Chain her up where Jenkins can keep an eye on her."
She was led to the table much too close to the infected soldier as the guard who had hold over her forced chains around her hand, pinning her to the table. Nancy shook her head, desperate to leave the situation. If only those men knew the danger they were in being around an infected.
"No. Not in here, not with him," She pleaded, eyes rounded as she stared at the waxy complexion of the man in front of her.
The superior officer scoffed as though the suggestion disgusted him. "You shouldn't have broken in here if you didn't want to stay."
Hands clad in her thick winter gloves, Nancy curled her fingers around the imposing chains and tugged desperately to free herself. "You don't understand. Not with him!" They all needed to get out of there right now, the man was beginning to shake. He wasn't far off changing into one of those things. And Nancy didn't want to be around to watch it.
"This is a restricted area, Miss," She was reminded. "You can just sit here for a bit. We're going to have to ask you a few questions."
The officer that was chaining her up grabbed the wire cutters she had stolen and handed them over as soon as he made sure the chains around her hand were tight enough to begin to cut off circulation. "Found these, sir."
The man inspected them, turning them over in his hands and testing their weight. All Nancy could do was focus on how the infected soldier looked like he was about to cough a lung up onto the table. "Very professional," The commander mused. "A little bit too professional. Didn't just drop in by accident then did you?"
"My little brother died here. I wanted to find out what killed him," She answered. If she told them the truth then maybe they would let her go and she could get away from this sick man as quickly as possible.
Her honesty didn't seem to get her anywhere though as the leading officer started barking out orders, looking straight through her. "Take the men, check the fences for any other breaches and search the area, she may not have come here alone."
She craned her neck to look at them as they began to leave. It was her last chance to get them to see reason. "Please," She begged. "Listen, you can't leave me here."
"Watch her, Jenkins," The man said, clearly uninterested in anything that she had to say.
The infected man answered back quickly. "Yes, mummy."
Nancy looked over at the man just as his superior did. While the man looked confused at the mix up, Nancy looked horrified. This man was closer to changing then she had originally thought. They really, really couldn't leave her there alone with him.
"Jenkins?" Questioned the man.
"Sorry," Was the weak response he got in reply. Jenkins hid his sweaty brow behind a hand in embarrassment. "Sir, I, I don't know what's the matter with me."
"Look," Nancy said slowly, finally gaining the man's attention. "Lock me up, fine, but not here. Please, anywhere but here."
For a second Nancy thought the soldier would relent and take her away, but then he shook his head and stormed out of the tent without another glance in their direction. Chained to a table not two metres away from the infected man, Nancy was stuck. She had gotten so far with avoiding her Jamie, hadn't let him touch her even when all she wanted to do was hold him close, and now she was going to go out by the very thing that had torn her life apart.
"You'll be alright, Miss," Quivered the man as Nancy lurched forward to tug at the chains again. "I'm just a little...just a little...just a little. What's the matter with you?" He stuttered out finally after getting control over his voice again.
"Please. Let me go," She tried again, eyes glued to Jenkins as she rattled the chains.
"Why would I do that?"
"'Cause you've got a scar on the back of your hand."
Jenkins looked confused by her reasoning. "Oh yes, but I don't see what that's got to do with anything."
"And you feel like you're gonna be sick, like something's forcing its way up your throat." She carried on, catching the way that he rolled his eyes at her. He truly didn't see what was to come for him, did he? Jenkins thumbed his throat self-consciously, eyes widening. "I know because I've seen it before."
"What's happening to me?" He asked finally.
"In a minute you won't be you anymore," She stated with conviction. "You won't even remember you. And unless you let me go, it's gonna happen to me too. Please!"
Jenkins began to choke, his time was almost up. But he still managed to get out a sentence full of denial. "What are you talking about?"
"What's your mothers' name?" Nancy asked, trying to keep the man talking. Maybe if he kept remembering who he was then it would take longer for him to change. Honestly, if there was even a slight chance that it would buy her some time she was going to do it.
"Matilda," Jenkins forced out breathlessly.
"You got a wife?"
"Yes."
"Wife's name," She demanded, not even blinking as she stared at his pale, sweaty face. He didn't answer her, choking over a breath, so Nancy continued to ask questions. "You got kids? What's your name?" Jenkins didn't respond, making gurgling noises in the back of his throat. Nancy tried one last time to get him to listen to her. "Please. Let me go. It's too late for you, I'm sorry. But please let me go."
"What do you me-me-mmmm," The man tried to say, stumbling over his letters until he came to stuttering out the one word that would give Nancy nightmares for the rest of her life if she ever made it out of this alive. "M-m-m-m-ummy."
He was changing, skin stretching and morphing as that same gas mask covered his face until the only thing that he could do was wail out for his mummy.
The Doctor had impatiently taken to sitting on a ledge in Jack's unorganised spaceship, wondering how on Earth it could take the man over ten minutes to load the om-com back online. If he had free reign over the place the Doctor would bet that he could have gotten it fixed in seconds, but the warning look that Jack had sent him when he offered had reluctantly kept him in his place.
It was Ella that had taken the time to ask Jack boundless questions. She may not trust the man completely, and neither did the Doctor for that matter, but she clearly had enough questions rattling around in her brain that she found the nerve to start questioning Jack. While the Doctor thought about the situation they were in, trying to fit all of the puzzle pieces together in his brain, he kept one ear open the entire time, listening to everything that Ella was asking.
Jack had stolen this ship which was no surprise to the Doctor seeing as he had to override the settings to get control over everything and he's also conned loads of other people from the Time Agency with faulty equipment for money. So it also wasn't a surprise to the Doctor when the man admitted to them that he was once part of the Time Agency himself. The Doctor knew Jack had to have had some type of motive to go out of his way charming people. It came across to him like a vendetta.
"So you used to be a Time Agent?" Ella clarified from her seat next to him. She was bent over, hands balancing on her shaking knees, questions that needed answers still clearly racing through her mind. The Doctor could practically hear her thinking. "And now you're trying to con them?"
"If it makes me sound any better, it's not for the money," Jack countered, still pressing at buttons on his control panel to connect the om-com even though he was facing Ella.
"Then what's this all for?"
Jack sighed, leaned back in his chair. "Woke up one morning when I was still working for them, found they'd stolen two years of my memories. I'd like them back."
"Wait, they can do that?" Ella asked and the Doctor didn't even have to know what she was thinking as she turned quickly to look at the Doctor, he could see it written all over her face.
Jack continued on seriously, like he wanted them both to understand what he was saying. "Two years of my life. No idea what I did. Neither of you trust me, and for all I know, you're both right not to."
The handset beside Jack binged loudly, informing them that the synch was complete and they could go to the crash site.
Acting like he'd never just revealed a big secret to them, Jack pressed at the handset and forced a smile onto his face. "Okay. We're good to go."
There was a moment of silence when Jack began to set some coordinates, and Ella took that opportunity to talk quietly to the Doctor, leaning over to him so she could whisper her words. The Doctor moved in slightly, looked her in her eyes even though he knew exactly what she was going to say.
"Is that what could've happened to me?"
The Doctor paused, trying to think if it was a possibility. The tests he'd run had never indicated anything of the sort, they were extremely broad so he wasn't able to tell if she even belonged in the time period that she was found in. It could be a potential thing to look into, but that just meant more testing on her part, and the Doctor didn't know how much she would go through without giving up. It seemed like she was on her last straw when they'd met, even offering to run those tests on her before had been hard enough.
The worst part of it all was how hopeful she had looked when she asked him. Like maybe they had found some type of lead to help them. For someone who barely even acknowledged the fact that she had lost the majority of her memories, the Doctor knew it had affected her. It took her long enough to tell himself and Rose, and even then it was basically forced out of her by the blonde. As much as the Doctor wanted to lie, he knew that he couldn't get her hopes up like that. It wasn't fair on her.
"I don't know," He said finally, hating the way that her face fell at his answer but knowing that he couldn't do anything about it at this moment, not when they were being chased by gas mask zombies in 1941.
If Jack had heard what Ella had just asked, he never showed it, instead clearing his throat slightly and pointing down at his controls with raised eyebrows at the Doctor. "Right. The crash site?" He double checked.
The Doctor nodded just slightly while Jack continued to fix the coordinates.
Jack's glorified junk of metal and disjointed pieces of alien technology all forced in together to form what he called a spaceship sped through the air and landed, tethered to a random building not far from the wreck. They walked the rest of the way, sticking to the shadows of the train tracks that the Doctor had followed when he sought the place out the first time, and the Doctor had managed to keep in the bitter comment that he had been wanting to make about how much better his Tardis was compared to Jacks' bulky ship.
They came to a stop a few paces behind the gated off area crawling with soldiers on every perimeter, and hid themselves partly behind one of the waiting bays to draw less attention to them.
Jack's voice was light when he spoke next, eyes lit up like they had just caught a lucky break. "Hey, they've got Algy on duty. Must be important."
"We've gotta get past," The Doctor said. He still needed to inspect the chula medicine ship to figure out what was happening. Empty or not, it could still help him greatly.
"We could make a diversion," Ella said, eyes fixed on the fencing separating them from where they need to go.
Jack nodded. "A distraction could work."
The Doctor edged forward around Ella to cut her off a bit and then sent Jack a stern look. There was no way he was allowing his companion to try and seduce a soldier so they could get in. He'd honestly rather just sneak in and hope they don't find him. Or they could use the psychic paper to get in. That always worked.
He was only slightly confused by the beaming amused smile that Jack gave him in return. "Don't worry, I've gotten to know Algy quite well since I've been in town. Trust me, I know his type," He said then, straightening his jacket out slightly. "I'll distract him. Don't wait up," He informed them as he began walking away.
A grin crept onto the Doctor's face, and it only got wider at the look of confusion that Ella had written all over her face. "Relax," He said. "He's a 51st century guy. He's just a bit more flexible when it comes to dancing. Oh I forgot how judgy you lot were in the early 2000s with sexuality. By his time you lot are spread out across half the galaxy...so many species, so little time."
"It's not that," Ella said with a shake of her head, though she did look surprised by his description of the 51st century. "It's just - he was laying it on pretty thick with me earlier I guess I just didn't pick it."
The Doctor continued to grin and watch over the area as Jack reached his friend. Of course, as nothing had gone their way today, the smile slipped from his face when the soldier dropped to his knees. From a distance, the Doctor could see the mask that began to protrude over the mans' face, forcing its way out of his mouth.
Barely having enough time to grab at Ella's hand, the Doctor managed to break into a run yelling for the guards who were rushing over to their superior officer to get back. Jack echoed his sentiment, pushing the men who got too close away.
The changed man was lying unresponsive on the tracks, not moving an inch since the Doctor and Ella came to a stop beside his figure. The Doctor didn't have to stare long at him before he came to a conclusion. And it wasn't a comforting thought to voice.
"The effect's becoming airborne, accelerating."
Ella stepped a little closer to the Doctor. "So we could be infected right now? We're gonna become one of those things?"
"Yeah," The Doctor said. "It's just a matter of time."
And then the sirens started again. A warning call for the danger of Nazi aircraft flying overhead. He watched soberly as Ella craned her neck up to look at the sky to listen to the distant sound of plane engines.
"Didn't you say that a bomb was going to land here?" She asked, pointing at the very ground they were standing on. The Doctor watched as she paled when Jack nodded. "Well, that's just what we need, isn't it."
"Never mind about that," The Doctor cut off before Ella could continue her rant. He couldn't deal with her freaking out anymore than she already was, he needed her focused like him. "If the contaminant's airborne, there's hours left."
"Until what?" Jack asked.
"'Till nothing. Forever. For the entire human race," Then, as though realising that he had just made the situation all the more worse to stay calm in, he turned to Ella to frantically straighten it out. "But we need to focus on sorting it out…" He trailed off, something catching his attention. "...Can anyone else hear singing?"
The noise was coming from a tent set up on the edge of the camp, and he knew that voice. The strong accent forced into a melodic rhythm of a nursery rhyme drew him into a rush over to the area. He poked his head through the canvas of the tent, took in the plain decorating within and the gas mask clad soldier slumped over the table...and then finally Nancy, who was still singing to keep the soldier placated.
When she finally noticed his appearance the singing stopped and for a tiny tense moment the Doctor thought the gas mask soldier was going to spring up and grab hold of Nancy. He managed to motion for her to continue singing which she did a little reluctantly. His eyes caught sight of chains keeping her hand pinned to the table's leg, and he shuffled through the tent door to get closer to her.
Behind him, he could hear both Ella and Jack peeking through the gap at the scene, but thankfully they knew to stay silent. The Doctor reached the cuffs, and with a muted flick of his sonic screwdriver, the grip on Nancy loosened and she pulled her arm back, finally free.
She shot from the chair and pushed her way out into the night without even taking a second glance towards the infected man and the Doctor followed her. They didn't have time to mess around.
The flood lights angled at the bomb sprung to life the second Jack and the Doctor gripped the edge of the tarp and pulled it off to reveal the metal cylindrical ship they were chasing through time and space. Ella hung back a bit and stood next to the girl, Nancy, she thought her name was, who was staring intensely at the thing.
"You see," Jack said as he rounded the ship to get closer to the Doctor. "Just an ambulance."
"That's an ambulance?" Nancy questioned disbelievingly. It was understandable seeing as she knew absolutely nothing about time travel and spaceships, it would have to be hard to take it all in, especially with the world falling apart around them.
Ella sidled a little closer to Nancy. "It's from another world," She said. There was no point beating around the bush about it. Nancy didn't utter any words about it, but Ella caught her swallowing and she nodded just slightly.
Across at the medical ship, Ella heard Jack curse as he looked over the exterior. "Someone's been trying to get in," He said next, irritation clear in his voice.
"Of course they have," The Doctor stated like it was obvious. "They think they've got their hands on Hitler's latest secret weapon. What're you doing?" He questioned.
"Sooner you see this thing is empty the sooner you'll know I had nothing to do with it," Something sparked from the ship and sent tendrils of heat in their direction as an alarm from within the ship pierced their eardrums. Ella jumped back, bringing her arms up to cover her face until the heat diffused in the cool night air. "Didn't happen last time," Jack said when he moved back over to the ambulance to attempt to get in again.
"It hadn't crashed last time. There'll be emergency protocols."
From her position a couple of metres away from the ambulance, Ella stood on her tippy toes to get a better look at what was going on. The Doctor and Jack were facing a lock of some sort that needed a password for access, but that wasn't the only thing that caught her eye. Above it, right next to a button was a blinking red light. Now Ella hadn't forgotten about mauve being the colour for danger but that sure as hell didn't look good in their position.
She chanced a couple of steps forward so she was closer to the ship and pointed over at the panel, eyes glued to the red light. "Doctor, what does that mean?"
As soon as the Doctor looked down at the light the gates behind them began to rock. Something was pushing against them trying to get in.
"Captain," The Doctor said urgently, pointing Jack over to the gates. "Secure those gates!"
"Why?"
"Just do it," He ordered. Jack didn't waste anymore time and began to rush over there when the Doctor turned his attention to Nancy. "Nancy, how did you get in here?"
Nancy shrugged nervously. "Cut the wire."
Quick as a flash, the Doctor grabbed his sonic screwdriver and tossed it at Ella. If she wasn't looking in his direction she totally wouldn't have seen it coming, it had been hard enough to catch between her fingers just then.
"Show Ella. Setting two thousands four hundred and twenty eight D - It reattaches barbed wire," He explained before she could even think to utter the question.
Ella gripped the sonic tight, "Point and flick the switch, right?"
The Doctor nodded. "Yes, now go!"
It was a short run to the fence that Nancy had cut through to get in which was lucky because Ella already felt weird enough being so far away from the Doctor when it was this dangerous. It was always better to be around the man who had a track record of getting them out of sticky situations pretty easily.
Nancy's hands shook as she helped to hold together to broken pieces of wire between her gloved fingers, and Ella was trying her hardest to keep her hands steady herself to let the sonic screwdriver do its work. For a second she thought that she had it on the wrong setting - it wasn't the easiest thing to figure out - and then the wires joined together with a resounding click and she let out a breath of relief as they changed to another one. The Doctor would have had this done in a couple of seconds flat.
Ella was concentrating hard to get this finished as quickly as possible when Nancy uttered her first question.
"Who are you? Who are any of you?"
"You'd probably never believe me," Ella said simply, a small smile rising to her lips as the second piece of wire joined together faster than the first.
"You just told me that was an ambulance from another world. There are people running 'round with gas mask heads calling for their mummies and the sky's full of Germans dropping bombs on me. Tell me, do you think there's anything left I couldn't believe?"
Ella paused and looked at the girl, really looked at her. She was shorter than Ella with frazzled brown hair tugged into tight braids, slightly crooked yellowing teeth and nose and cheeks that were bitten red from the cold. The thing that really stood out about her though, was how skinny she was. Nancy looked like she hadn't seen a proper meal since before the war started, scrawny and pale, her clothes hanging off her in odd angles as they shielded her from the cold. Honestly, with all that she had been through it seemed that believing that they're time travellers was the least of her worries.
"We're time travellers from the future with a time travel machine," Ella told her simply.
"Mad, you are," Nancy breathed next, but she didn't do anything to deny the fact. "All right. You got a time travel machine, I'll believe ya. Believe anything, me. But what future?'
Ella followed her eye line up to the planes and barrage balloons that painted the sky. Bombs were still being dropped, parts of the city destroyed before their very eyes. It would be easy to believe that there's going to be nothing left of the country, that it'll all go up in flames. But it doesn't, and Ella wasn't going to let Nancy believe that.
She leaned forward, getting the girls' attention with a hand to her shoulder and holding her gaze intently. "Nancy, this isn't the end. I know how it looks but the world doesn't end like this."
"How can you say that? Look at it."
Ella squeezed Nancy's shoulder tightly. "Listen to me, I live in this city in like...fifty years time. I have a little apartment in the city and I work two jobs. The world is definitely not over from this war. I promise."
"From here?" Nancy asked with wariness clear in her tone.
"I'm a Londoner. And so is my friend, Rose, she's in London right now all the way in 2006. There's still a life after this, Nancy."
Nancy shook her head, her eyes scrutinising over Ella. "But...but you're not...German."
Ella looked over her shoulder to make sure the Doctor wasn't close enough to hear her say this, before turning back to Nancy with a kind smile. "Don't tell the Doctor I said this but...Nancy they don't win. The Germans don't come here. You win."
The tiniest of smiles curled at the corner of Nancy's lips. "We win?" She questioned as though just to be sure.
Ella nodded, watching the relief pass over Nancy's face for just a second before she's gripping her hand and pulling her from the ground. "Come on, we better get back."
The Doctor had managed to get the ambulance open by the time Nancy and Ella made their way back to them. There mustn't have been anything inside because when Jack heaved himself up onto the metal and looked inside he shot the Doctor a satisfied look.
"It's empty," Jack said. "Look at it."
"What do you expect in a Chula Medical Transporter? Bandages, cough drops?" The Doctor crossed his arms over his chest and Ella watched as he turned his attention over to her. "El?"
Ella hesitated a second, thinking. The Doctor must've known what it was but he was prompting her to figure it out herself. If the ship was empty but not really empty then that meant there was something inside they couldn't see. It had to be something that all Chula ships had in them because the Doctor had made the connection between Jack's ship and the ambulance when they first teleported. What was something that Jack's time machine had that the Chula ambulance would also have to have?
"You mean nanogenes right?" Ella asked after a bit.
The Doctor snapped his fingers in her direction and nodded. "It wasn't empty, Captain. There was enough nanogenes in there to rebuild a species."
At the news, Jack visibly paled, face dropping into a deep frown. "Oh god."
"Getting it now, are we? When the ship crashes, the nanogenes escape. Billions upon billions of them. Ready to fix all the cuts and bruises in the whole world. But what they find first is a dead child. Probably killed earlier that night and wearing a gas mask."
"So they could bring him back to life?" Ella asked.
"What's life?" The Doctor shot back. "Life's easy. A quirk of matter. Nature's way of keeping meat fresh. Nothing to a nanogene. One problem though - these nanogenes, they're not like the ones on your ship. This lot have never seen a human being before, don't know what a human being's supposed to look like. All they've got to go on is one little body and there's not enough left."
"They got it wrong," Ella said, realising where the Doctor was going with this.
He nodded. "And they carry right on. They do what they're programmed to do, they patch it up. Can't tell what's gas mask and what's skull but they do their best. Then off they fly, off they go, work to be done. 'Cause you see, now they think they know what people should look like and it's time to fix the rest. And they won't ever stop. They won't ever, ever stop. The entire human race is gonna be torn down and rebuilt in the form of one terrified child looking for its mother. And nothing in the world can stop it!"
Captain Jack sunk under the glare that the Doctor sent him. "I didn't know."
One last withering glare was all that the Doctor responded to Jack with and then he was rounding the ship towards Ella, dropping to his knees beside the control panel. Ella stood in between the tracks watching as the Doctor began fiddling with some of the buttons distractedly, and then her eyes followed over to Jack who was putting some distance between himself and the Doctor, either too embarrassed or too scared of the Doctor to keep close.
It wasn't until Nancy called her name frantically that Ella crossed the tracks towards the girl, confused for just a second until she followed Nancy's outstretched palm to see a horde of gas mask patients moving towards them. They were close enough by the time she reached Nancy that she could hear the calls for their mummies echoing in the air.
Turning on her heel, Ella rushed back towards the Doctor, just about to tell him they were coming when her eyes caught on the blinking red light once more. She noted how tense the Doctor was and then realised that he probably knew that the infected was coming for them.
"It's bringing the gas mask people here, isn't it?" She asked.
The Doctor didn't even look up from his work when he answered her. "The ship thinks it's under attack. It's calling up the troops. Standard protocol."
The infected didn't look like fighters as they wobbled along the train tracks towards them...they just looked like normal people. "But they aren't troops."
"They are now. This is a battlefield ambulance. The nanogenes don't just fix you up, they get you ready for the front line. Equip you, program you."
"That's why that child's so strong? Why it could break through walls...and phone people?" Ella asked, it was getting harder to keep the nerves out her voice with the more she kept learning about the things.
"It's a fully equipped Chula Warrior, yes," The Doctor said. Forgetting about what he was working on with the controls, he stood back up and faced the infected people like the rest of them. "All that weapons tech in the hands of a hysterical four year old, looking for his mummy. And now there's an army of them."
The infected people on the other side of the fence were just standing there, looking at them. They weren't making an effort to get around the barrier. It was almost like they were just standing there guarding the place, trapping them inside. Jack moved closer towards them, walking out onto the tracks to peer out at the gas mask people on the other side of the fence.
"Why don't they attack?" Jack questioned.
"Good little soldiers waiting for their commander," The Doctor answered simply.
Jack looked back over at them, eyes focused on the Doctor. "The child?" He asked incredulously.
"Jamie," Came Nancy's soft voice.
Jack narrowed his eyes in confusion as he looked over at the girl. "What?"
"Not the child," Nancy started, voice becoming more resolute and hardened as she repeated herself. "Jamie."
Ella's eyes searched over Nancy's tense face. There was a connection between the boy and Nancy, enough to get the girl defensive about it. Maybe she was the only one who noticed this, because Jack looked up towards the sky and the Doctor was staring out at the Chula soldiers that had come to a stand still while they waited for the child - Jamie - to come.
"The bomb could drop any second," Jack uttered nervously, eyes searching the sky for any indicator of the thing.
"What's the matter Captain? Bit close to the volcano for you?" The Doctor asked sarcastically.
Nancy looked lost in her own thoughts, Ella could tell. There might have been a bit of...guilt too from the way she shrunk back away from the soldiers and closer to Ella. Her tone was full of emotion when she spoke next. "He's just a little boy."
"I know," The Doctor said as he moved closer.
"He's just a little boy who wants his mummy," She carried on tearily.
"I know," He assured her when he came to a stop in front of her. "There isn't a little boy born who wouldn't tear the world apart to save his mummy. And this little boy can," He looked over at Ella, held her gaze for a regretful second. "I don't know what to do."
Nancy whimpered then and if Ella looked hard enough she could see the glimmer of tears shining in the corner of her eyes. "It's all my fault," She said.
"No," Ella told her, moving forward over the tracks to get closer to Nancy and put her hand on her shoulder with a light squeeze.
"It is," Nancy insisted. "It's all my fault."
Ella's forehead wrinkled in confusion as she tried to figure out who the little boy was to Nancy. "Who is he to you, Nancy?" She asked.
A chorus of mummy's rang out around the crash site and Nancy dissolved into tears, shoulders shaking as she choked over sobs. Not really knowing what else to do in that moment, Ella kept her hand on the girl's shoulder, squeezing tightly to try to give her even an ounce of the comfort that she clearly needed. The Doctor was studying them, eyes stuck on Nancy. For a moment Ella wondered what he was thinking about.
"Nancy," He said finally. "What age are you? 20, 21? Older than you look, yes?"
Somewhere close to them, had to be only a couple kilometres away from where they were standing, a bomb whizzed overheard and buried itself in the ground. Heat erupted close by them, tufts of golden yellows and reds rippled up into the sky, burning anything close by to a crisp. The ground beneath their feet rippled and hummed like they were in an earthquake.
The reminder that this was going to happen to them any moment sent a shiver of realisation down Ella's spine. They didn't have time to stand around talking, they had to try and get out of there right now before it was too late.
It seemed that Jack echoed her thoughts as he spoke over the distant rumbling from the explosion. "Doctor, that bomb...we've got seconds."
Another bomb exploded near them, closer this time, right by where some of the soldiers were lined up, waiting. The ground shook even more dangerously under their feet.
"You can teleport us out," Ella said, he seemed to be able to do it before so why not now.
A somber look passed over his face and he shook his head. "Not you guys. The nav-com's back online, gonna take too long to override the protocols."
"So it's Volcano Day," The Doctor said, not tearing his eyes away from the weeping Nancy to look at Jack. "Do what you've got to do."
Jack barely wasted a second before clicking a button and disappearing from the area completely. Trying her absolute best not to feel bitter about the fact that he had practically left them for dead, Ella crossed her arms over herself, pulled her jacket closer to her body. It was the Doctor who didn't seem at all affected by Jack leaving, continuing his conversation where he left off before the first bomb dropped.
"How old were you five years ago, 15, 16? Old enough to give birth anyway."
Oh, Ella thought in realisation. The little boy was Nancy's child. The little boy who was looking for his mummy belonged to her. The look on Nancy's face transformed into one of horror at the Doctor's words as tears continued to spill out over her cheeks. That was enough confirmation to figure out that it was the truth.
"He's not your brother, is he?" The Doctor asked, his voice taking on a kind tone.
Nancy shrunk, unable to speak at all under the weight of all that guilt and shame she carried on her shoulders. Through the sobs that shook her entire body, she forced a tiny nod.
"A single mother in 1941. So you hid, you lied," Nancy continued to nod at the Doctor's words, face screwed up in grief as all of the secrets she hid came crashing down around her. "You even lied to him."
The locked gate flew open with ease and the little boy led the crowd, his small stature swallowed by the imposing adult figures behind him. The voice that came from Jamie was the same hopeful one that Ella had heard from the very beginning, but now it meant more and it was harder for her to be scared of him. He was just a lost little boy fighting against the programming in his body to find the one person he wanted most in the world. His mummy who was there, standing right in front of him.
"Are you my mummy?"
A tiny whimper flew out of Nancy's mouth as she looked between the Doctor and Ella, clearly at a loss for what to do.
"He's gonna keep asking, Nancy," The Doctor said. "He's never gonna stop. Tell him."
Jamie began to move towards them, the army of gas mask people trailing behind him as he continued to call out for his mummy. Nancy's eyes widened at the Doctor's instruction and she shook her head instantly.
But the Doctor was insistent. "Nancy, the future of the human race is in your hands. Trust me...tell him."
The child continued forward as Nancy tried to pull herself together. "Are you my mummy? Are you my mummy? Are you my mummy?" It repeated over and over again.
The hand that Ella had curled over Nancy's shoulder released, and with a soft push she got the girl moving towards her child. The Doctor moved over to Nancy then, they were that close that their shoulders touched as they watched the mother meet her child halfway on the tracks.
"Yes," Nancy said shakily. "Yes, I am your mummy."
"Mummy?"
"I'm here," She told him, crouching in front of the boy.
"Are you my mummy?" Jamie continued to ask.
Nancy nodded. "Yes," She breathed.
"Are you my mummy?"
The Doctor let out a shaky breath beside her, shoulders practically deflating in disappointment. "He doesn't understand. There's not enough of him left."
"So what do we do now?" Ella asked nervously, watching as bombs continued to creep closer to where they were, erupting in every direction.
He shrugged. "Hope that Jack's up in that ship figuring a way out for us," He told her. Ella's face fell at the suggestion, and the Doctor grabbed her hand in his without a second's hesitation.
It seemed that Nancy had yet to give up hope of getting her child to recognise her, her voice full of strength as she kept trying to get through to Jamie. "I am your mummy. I will always be your mummy. I'm so sorry."
Nancy pulled her boy into a hug, arms wrapped securely around his middle as she kept on apologising. It looked like Jamie knew what to do and leant into the hug, arms around her shoulders, head leaning on the side of her neck.
A cloud of the bright yellow nanogenes sprung out around the two, enveloping them in a light. Nancy didn't seem bothered by them swarming as she held her son as close as possible. The beads of light traced her face, lingering as though trying to figure out what she was.
The Doctor squeezed Ella's hand, and when she looked up at him there was fresh hope painted on his face. "Come on, please," He breathed, staring directly at the mother and child. "Come on you clever little nanogenes. Figure it out. The mother, she's the mother. It's gotta be enough information. Figure it out!"
A few of the nanogenes swept over Jamie's gas mask clad face and they glowed, their small size widening just a bit to stretch over and map out his face.
"What're they doing?" Ella asked, watching them flit about in the air around them.
The Doctor pointed, finger directed towards the boy. "See, recognising the same DNA!"
The nanogenes that were floating around disappeared suddenly as Jamie recoiled from his mother, the momentum pushing Nancy to the ground. Ella and the Doctor didn't waste a second as they made their way over to the two as Nancy watched on in confusion.
The Doctor paused in front of the child, eyes wide and full of hope. "Oh come on," He said, bracing himself. "Give me a day like this. Give me this one."
Carefully, the Doctor's fingers grappled with the gas mask that covered Jamie's face. The material budged, no longer melded into the skin and the Doctor was able to pull it off with a quick tug. There the boy was, totally unscathed and looking up at his mother in wonder. Nancy choked out a sob of happiness at the sight and Ella grinned when the Doctor pulled the boy up and into his arms, laughing and grinning away as he did so.
"Welcome back! 20 years till pop music, you're gonna love it," He told the little boy giddily, patting his back with a laugh when a small smile inched at Jamie's lips and setting him down to be with his mother again.
Nancy's hand curled around her son's shoulder and pulled him close. "What happened?" She asked, speechless as she stared down at her very much alive and very much healed son.
"The nanogenes recognised the superior information. The parent DNA. They didn't change you because you changed them. Mother knows best!" He declared with another laugh.
Her hand smoothed over the tufts of her son's blond hair. "Oh, Jaime," She cried with a watery smile.
Ella couldn't stay in the happy moment for long though, because another bomb dropped dangerously close to where they were. Then she remembered Jack's warning about how they had seconds until the one was supposed to fall on them. That would have had to be a good five minutes ago, and yet they were still alive.
"Doctor, that bomb," Ella reminded, her eyes searching the now cloudy sky for even a sign of it.
The Doctor didn't look too worried, and even shrugged. "Taken care of it," He said simply.
"What?"
He stretched out an arm with a grand flourish, eyes still alight with joy. "Psychology."
And then she could hear the whistling of a bomb whirring towards them. It broke through the clouds, rumbling at a dangerously fast speed downwards, ready to blow up the second it met the ground. For a moment she thought that was it, they were going to die. But the bomb just...stopped in mid air suddenly.
Hovering in the darkness not too far from the bomb was Jack's ship. He must've been using the same invisible beam that he had used to save her with earlier to suspend the bomb from dropping on top of them. Jack teleported to sit on top of the bomb, and pointed down to them.
"Doctor!" He yelled.
The Doctor peered up at him, clearly impressed by what he was doing. "Good lad."
"The bomb's already commenced detonation. I've put it in stasis, but it won't last long!"
"Change of plan, don't need the bomb. Can you get rid of it, safe as you can?"
Both Jack and the bomb disappeared and then, with a flash of light, reappeared a second later. "Ella?" Jack called out urgently. "Love the shirt!" And then he was gone again.
A smile graced her lips as she tugged at the old material and looked over to the Doctor for validation. He was walking towards the frozen gas mask people spread out along the tracks, hands opened wide. A bunch of the nanogenes hovered around his outstretched hands, bobbing and buzzing away.
"What're you doing?" She asked.
"Software patch," He answered, watching as the nanogenes swarmed around his palms, tickling his fingertips. "Gonna email the upgrade. You want moves, Ella. I'll give you moves!"
He thrust his arms forward and the nanogenes spilled from his hands and shot towards the patients. They swarmed and were quick to fix the sick. The gas mask people were lowered to the ground as they began to return to normal.
"Everybody lives, Ella. Just this once! Everybody lives!" The Doctor exclaimed, bouncing on his feet at the sight of the patients, faces free of their gas masks, pulling themselves from the ground, looking around in confusion.
The Doctor bounded over to a man in a white doctor's coat and Ella watched as he clapped him over the shoulder with a grin. Ella couldn't make out what he was saying, but the man didn't stay in the spot for long before rushing back over to the Chula medical warship, pulling his sonic screwdriver out as he went. He scrambled up onto the base of the ship and then called out to everyone scattered around the railway line.
"Right, you lot, lots to do. Beat the Germans, save the world, don't forget the welfare state!" He lowered his voice when he looked to Ella next, peering down at her as the people began to leave. "Setting this to self destruct soon as everybody's clear. History says there was an explosion here. Who am I to argue with history?"
"Usually the first," Ella said with a grin, one that the Doctor mirrored as he tinkered with the ship's wiring.
The Doctor burst through the Tardis doors and practically skipped up the grating towards the console, talking at the speed of light at Ella who had paused at the entrance to close the doors behind them and then bounded off after him.
"The nanogenes will clean up their mess and switch themselves off 'cause I just told them to. Nancy and Jamie will go to Dr Constantine for help...ditto. All in all, all things considered, fantastic!" He stretched his arms out, spinning around with that same childish grin on his face.
Ella's smile matched his intensity. "I think that's the coolest thing I've ever seen you do," She admitted.
He continued to spin in circles. "And everybody lives, El, everybody lives! I need more days like this," The Doctor finally stopped spinning and circled the console panel to ping the bell. "Go on, ask me anything, I'm on fire."
"What about Jack?" She asked and the Doctor stilled in his movements immediately. "Will he be able to get rid of the bomb?"
The Doctor reached out and pulled the Tardis into flight with a crank of a lever. He fixed her with one of those determined looks of his. "Everybody lives," He repeated.
Much to the Doctor's horror, Ella made him put on some jazz music before they opened the doors to let Jack in and turned the dial up to full ball when the doors opened. They peered down the hallway to see Jack in his ship, clutching a champagne glass between his fingers.
Ella leaned against the console and smiled when Jack finally noticed them and gestured for him to get in. "Come on then, today's your lucky day."
He wasted no time in flinging himself into the ship and up to where they were standing, eyes flitting around the space to take it all in. The Doctor spent the time fiddling with a couple of controls concentrating deeply with a frown. A smirk quirked on Ella's face when Jack sent her a questioning glance at the man's sudden change of demeanor.
"He's sulking 'cause he can't remember any of his moves," She offered in explanation.
The Doctor scowled at her without any real heat. "Oi!" He protested before turning to finally regard Jack. "Close the doors will ya, your ship's about to blow up there's gonna be a draft," Jack didn't hesitate to do so and then leant his back against the wooden doors as he continued to stare. "Welcome to the Tardis," The Doctor announced with a smile.
"Much bigger on the inside," Jack remarked when he found his voice again.
"You'd better be," The Doctor told him sternly.
"What he means…" Ella cut in swiftly. "Is that he's still moody about the whole dancing thing."
Ella continued to grin cheekily at the Doctor as he hit a button on the console and the music changed to a much more upbeat instrumental piece. She watched on as his eyes lit up and he began clicking his fingers in time with the beat.
"El!" He said suddenly. "I just remembered...I can dance!"
His feet moved in sync as he marched over to her. Ella barely had time to think before one hand was stationed at her waist and his other clasping with her own hand, tugging her into a slight shuffle. A laugh sprung from her mouth when she almost tripped over her own feet several times trying to keep up with the pace that the Doctor set. He might be alright at dancing but that doesn't mean she was gifted by any means.
The music hit a crescendo as they rounded the console, and then the Doctor spun her once before swinging her down suddenly, hands tightly gripped on her waist and upper back to keep her from toppling backwards.
She gasped at the movement, head spinning until the Doctor helped her to be the right way up again. She spotted something flashing out of the corner of her eye when she was pulled up again and she pulled away from the Doctor quickly and spun on her heels to look at the console.
Over in the middle of buttons, a strange keypad was lit up with a blinking blue light. Ella looked over at it, wondering if she had ever seen that before glancing at the Doctor from over her shoulder, the man standing behind her.
She pointed over at the light. "What's that?"
The Doctor got closer to Ella and peered over her shoulder to see what she was looking at. "Oh, that's the answering machine."
"You have an answering machine?"
"Of course," He said with a scoff like it was obvious. "Just press that button there," He instructed, pointing to one of the buttons on the left.
Ella did so and listened as the music playing through the Tardis' speakers stopped only to be replaced by Rose's soft and slightly hesitant voice.
"Uhh hi...I'm ready to come back - if - if that's alright," Rose's voice flooded the speakers and echoed around the Tardis. "Yeah, uhmm, just call me if that's alright."
A smile slipped onto Ella's face at hearing Rose's voice and she spun to look at the Doctor again. It was a good sign that Rose had called after this particular adventure when the Doctor was in such a good mood, because when she looked over at him, he didn't look annoyed or unhappy by it. That was always a good sign.
From across the Tardis and in the corner of the corridor, Jack cleared his throat and grabbed both of their attentions. He raised an eyebrow when they both looked over at him. "Wait, do you have more people travelling with you?" He asked.
"Yes," The Doctor said simply, moving away from Ella to fiddle with buttons on the panel once again.
This seemed to surprise Jack, whose eyes widened slightly at the admission. "Really? 'Cause you two have this strange dynamic going on," He said, gesturing around himself. "Lots of flirtatious looks," He stated next with a small smirk.
Ella flushed slightly and looked away from the Doctor as he awkwardly cleared his throat and took the handbrake off, pushing the ship back into time and space.
"Right," The Doctor said after a moment of silence. "Let's get Rose."